Yugoloths: Do They Have an Identity Beyond the Blood War?

dave2008 said:

That is not D&D lore at all really. In D&D devils collect souls to increase their power mostly I believe

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dave2008 said:

Did it, I'm not so sure. Is that idea really even Christian. I am not a biblical scholar, but the Christian Hell doesn't seem to be particularly ordered. That concept has been layered on by literary tradition. Now, if your saying D&D is part of that literary tradition - I get it. But I don't think it is a simple cause and effect.

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Paul Farquhar said:

It depends what you mean by "Christian". In the medieval period Hell as an ordered place of punishment, where monsters tormented the wicked in poetically appropriate ways, was widely taught, and still has an influence on modern Catholicism (Purgatory). It's not in the Bible though, and most modern evangelical Christians don't believe it. What Christians actually do believe varies widely, since the Bible doesn't actually say.

But you are right in saying it's much more complex than simple cause and effect.

Unless you are talking about D&D Daemons, which very much is a case of simple cause (gap in the alignment wheel) and effect (NE demon-knockoffs with an alternate spelling).

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dave2008 said:

Did it, I'm not so sure. Is that idea really even Christian. I am not a biblical scholar, but the Christian Hell doesn't seem to be particularly ordered. That concept has been layered on by literary tradition. Now, if your saying D&D is part of that literary tradition - I get it. But I don't think it is a simple cause and effect.

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Paul Farquhar said:

It depends what you mean by "Christian" . . .

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Satyrn said:

I gotta say, I'm confused by Paul's response.


I would've thought the thing to say is "right, I was saying D&D's hierarchical devils are drawn from Dante's work" since that seemed to be exactly what he was originally saying.

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dave2008 said:

I had a similar impression, that was why I mentioned literary tradition.

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Shemeska said:

The 'loths had a massive amount of detail and in-game history fleshed out during 2e, and late 3.x plPersonally I'd present the planar content in MToF as a mixture of Mordenkainen having been wrong as a mortal regarding the history of the planes, or since the book was in-game stolen and presented by Shemeshka the Marauder, Sigil's best yugoloth had every incentive to joyously lie and fabricate false content that botched actual history and utterly downplayed the yugoloths. That's what I'd go with, otherwise you'd have to assume that the original Planescape sources just weren't considered.

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Parmandur said:

As somebody with some expertise with the literary, religious and historical scene...no, not really. It has more to do with original pulp creations and filling the grid, and pretty much nothing to do with anything Medieval or Catholic.

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Satyrn said:

What leads you to say that the creators of D&D took pretty much no influence from Dante in shaping the Nine Hells and its devils?

It seems a likely source of inspiration to me.

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iserith said:

Forkheet is up for it, but it only accepts payment in the form of children's teeth (which are kind of hard to obtain).

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